Fiesque

The 19th-century French composer Edouard Lalo is remembered for his Symphonie Espagnole and his opera Le Roi d'Ys. Yet his earlier work, Fiesque, based on a play by Schiller about a revolution in 16th-century Genoa, has one of the strangest non-performance histories of any opera.

Lalo wrote this big, three-act piece for a Parisian competition in 1868. But there was no production, perhaps because its republican theme was too daring for the Second Empire. The Franco-Prussian war and the Paris Commune soon followed, putting paid to the work's remaining prospects, since neither managements nor audiences were keen to revisit revolutionary subject matter. So Fiesque was shelved for 140 years, until the Montpellier Festival gave it in concert in 2006. Now University College Opera presents the opera's first UK production, revealing it as a work of some stature.

The score could be placed somewhere between Berlioz and Bizet, and shows consistent rhythmic and orchestral invention, as well as a sure sense of pace. The plot shows the flawed hero conspiring against the ruling Genoese family and replacing them through popular revolt, only to be assassinated when power lies within his grasp.

Emma Rivlin's production delivers both the crowd scenes and the personal confrontations with success, with the student chorus clearly enjoying the moments of insurrection. The two male leads - David Curry's Fiesque and Robert Davies's Verrina - provide exciting singing and a clear sense of engagement. Fiesque may not have much of a past but, on this showing, it has a future.